Salvation
by nochesombra
Summary: A delve into the mind of the Ice King (what goes on in there?) and if he can escape the clutches of insanity that his Crown has thrown upon him. I seem to be terrible at summaries and this is my first fanfic so please be nice :) Rated T. ENJOY! One-shot. R&R please.


Salvation

**AN/ Hi guys, nochesombra here. Uh, so yeah. First fanfic. To be honest with y'all, I made this account so that I could get better at story writing. I know, right? Pretty weird but there was no other way. Unless there is. Wow, pretty awkward. ANYWAY, I would like at least someone to review this story and give me some feedback, it's the only way to get better I guess. To that/those person/people I THANK THEE. OKAY ENOUGH RAMBLING, LET'S GOOOOOOO...**

**Disclaimer: I do not under any circumstances own Adventure Time, nor is Finn in my closet.**

The cold, to anyone other than him, would be unbearable. Its cruel nature of constant nipping and breathing it's essence at the unfortunate victims would make them flee, leaving their once-warm presence just as cold as the rest of its territory. It would welcome only the ones worthy of its brutality and shoo those who crumble under the first of its devious manners.

He, however, was accustomed to the cold's behaviour and in fact enjoyed its companionship when he became lonely, which was unfortunately, most of the time.

The Ice King would always find safety in the thing that he was most comfortable with which, not surprisingly, was the art of magic. Specifically, this magic was the power of commanding ice at his will.

To the average outsider, one would wonder, why on Ooo would someone as powerful as this wizard need safety and an escape. The Ice King would require his much needed and desired safety from the darkness of his own mind.

His mind was captive to several mysterious mentally-conjured philosophies in his experienced life. First of all, one of the strange notions was his "Wizard Eyes". This ability, or as he sometimes viewed it, a curse, was more disturbing than helpful, and would allow the frail, old man to observe the odd creatures existing among the living plane.

Second of all, the most disconcerting and unnerving problem with his mind was the voices. He heard them almost all the time. One was rarer than the other two and it had been christened by the Ice King himself as The Sane voice. It brought him happiness and reality and he found refuge in it especially when the other voices tortured him.

The main perpetrator was more often than not the voice that had been given the name The Threat after only a few encounters. It would belittle him and regard the Ice King as worthless. Almost every visit it made to his conscious mind, a threat would greet him. The Ice King, however, had worked up a small defence against the constant barrage of insults and resorted to digging out his rare friend, The Sane, to give him the confidence to banish the voice from his problematic mind.

The last voice, and one he knew all too well, was The Me. It was simply the Ice King's own voice, just in his head. It held the authority to make the Ice King say and do things without second guessing. It confused him at times; it would be comforting at times when The Threat went too far but it would sometimes, unusually, jest with The Threat and participate in the emotional battering against the Ice King.

Recently, not only the cold has been spending its eternal presence with the Ice King, but The Sane has too. Not wanting to scare his rare remedy away, the Ice King was revelling in what he thought was a most soothing and caring voice and refrained from asking his usual questions that may send the voice away when in doubt. Sometimes it did that, maybe to think about the question bore before it or to let the Ice King mull over his own question to find the answer for himself.

Either way, it worked out the same. He would figure it out and The Sane would make itself known, or when the Ice King was seriously troubled about the question, The Sane would come back to him with a solution.

This day, The Threat had been especially evil and cornered the Ice King in his own mind screaming insults at him and promising that when it got out of his mind, which it assured was possible and soon, it would find the Ice King and torture him. The Ice King had never experienced this sort of abuse from The Threat before and did not like it one bit. Hell, he didn't even know how it came to this.

At first, the Ice King wasn't surprised by what The Threat was saying to him and didn't pay it much mind; and then it got worse. The insults changed from the dreary "Old Man!" and "Idiot…" to things much worse. The voice rose and trembled with hate, threatening that it would burn his Kingdom down or torturing the old wizard. Before he knew it, the Ice King was huddled in the corner of his room laying in the foetal position, sobs falling out of him in un-rhythmic patterns.

As soon as the voice had risen, the Ice King wasn't paying any attention to his surroundings and simply darted to the other side of the room trying to get away from the horrific voice inside his head, but it was in vain. There was no escaping at that time and the Ice King meekly endured it. All the while, he was whispering his friend's familiar name, begging for its calmness.

When his liberator came, The Sane.

It argued with The Threat, which left not too long after the Sane made itself known, leaving a stunned and broken old man on the floor. The Me had been silent through the whole thing, unable to decide if it wanted to join The Threat or rebel against it; only now did it speak up.

"Has it gone?" The Me asked in the Ice King's broken tone.

"What happened? It was much worse today." The sympathetic voice observed quietly. No sooner than when the voice softly spoke did the Ice King return from his protective huddle. Instead of The Me replying, the Ice King spoke, "I don't know," he spoke in a hushed tone, afraid that speaking too loudly would gain him another visit from the corrupt voice, "It started screaming at me. I don't know what I did." He mused.

"My friend," The Sane began, invoking familiarity between the two, "Only you can decide what to do with your own life. Your own mind. I am not always be here to help you because you don't call on me. The same applies for the others. I agree that it is hard and requires a certain amount of dedication but the sooner you break through that wall, the sooner your salvation will become known to you. Your escape from this labyrinth. When you master this, all voices will be banished, even The Me and I." The Sane spoke softly, finally giving the Ice King the solution he has been looking for all this time but was unable to figure it out for himself.

"But… I can't do any of this without you. You told me how to overcome things and you help me. I can't just get rid of you! That's… a-absurd!" The Ice King pleaded, hoping there was another way.

"No, it's not," The Sane reassured in its never-changing monotone, "You would have come up with the answers to your questions but I simply gave you them to you before you wrecked yourself. Do you still not understand? I am you. The Threat is you. The Me is you. We are simply different parts of you… Do you still trust me?" The Sane asked weakly, hoping to Glob that it still held some sort of value to the very old man.

The Ice King felt a pang of understanding and regret hit his gut, hard. "O-of course! I just… I didn't know… W-wait. What is my salvation e-exactly?" The Ice King questioned curiously, gaining a light chuckle from the voice in his messed-up head.

"Well, I would want you to find out for yourself but I feel that that wouldn't be very… helpful," The Sane replied in its once-again melodious voice, "I believe that your salvation is a physical being. You already know it…. deep-down anyway. You may consider him what you want, a friend, an enemy, but what will always be certain is that he is your sanity. You must reclaim him."

The Ice King became frustrated, "Why must you always speak in riddles?!" he screamed, unafraid of the consequence that is The Threat, "You are about to tell me how to escape this twisted mind of mine, and you don't even tell me?" The Ice King's ranting had him pacing across the room, oblivious to the intruder.

"Maybe I shouldn't trust you! Sure, you help me but you never really help me!" The Ice King cried, not caring that he wasn't making any sense.

"My friend," The Sane's sudden voice quenched the fires of fury in the Ice King as he strained to hear and feel its beautiful velvet touch, "You do not need me anymore, you need not trust me anymore. But please, for this one last time, trust me. You have found your salvation."

At this, the Ice King perked up from his hunched position, 'What could _that_ mean?' he mused silently, aware of the fact that The Sane could hear him whether he spoke out loud or in his head with The Me.

He looked around, hoping to find answers when his eyes stumbled upon the person by the window. 'Him? My salvation?' He looked at the intruder's face and saw sympathy. The Ice King spoke up, asking not only the intruder but himself and The Sane the question,

"Finn?"


End file.
